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Sunday, April 24, 2016

[Yasmin_discussions] Mercado Central

Yasminers

please find my own thoughts/responses in reaction to the questions thatFrancois-Joseph Lapointe

Roger Malina

An Art-Science Career is like Piloting Through Chaos

ROGER MALINA answers to the Mercado Central questions for art-sciencehybrids and lessons learned:

1- 1- What is your background as a scientist?In the arts, design or humanities?

I obtained a BSc in Physics at MIT, followed by a PhD in Astronomy atUC Berkeley. I was lucky enough as an undergraduate to be involved inthe beginning of x ray astronomy, and got the bug for the 'thrill ofdiscovery'. I went on to lead a team that built the telescopes andinstruments for a NASA satellite(https://heasarc.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/euve/euvegof.html ) and thenoperated the satellite. I was then head hunted and started a career inresearch administration leading to my job as Director of anAstronomical Observatory (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marseille_Observatory ) .

I started a career in the art world when my father died in 1982. I wasthen a postdoc in space astrophysics. My father had started theart-science journal Leonardo in 1966(http://leonardo.info/isast/leostory.html ). I decided to try and keepit going and started two art-science non profits one in Paris(http://www.olats.org/ ) and one in San Francisco(http://leonardo.info/index.html ). I was 32. I took a conscious riskat a time I was 200% consumed by my scientific career. Since then Ihave been very involved in the art science world, through publishing,organized workshops and artists residencies in scientificlaboratories.

Lesson learned (see end section) This is piloting through chaos. Whenyour personal life, in this case my father's death, intrudes on yourprofessional life- think it through and jump, take the risk if thereis a connection essential to one's personal integrity. Initially mywork in art was motivated by the memory of my father and his legacy.35 years later, that instinctive decision to keep Leonardo going hasbecome a core of my motivation in life. I had never run a publicationor a nonprofit, but we had the startup mentality and with a group offriends and colleagues it worked.

2- When and how did you become involved in a hybrid art/science practice?

Lesson learned: when someone shares your obsession, they probably willstill share it 30 years later: we kept in touch. Keep in touch withpartners in crime!.

Lesson Learned; Art Science research is as difficult as any otherfield. It takes method, discipline and invention,

3- What have been the major obstacles to overcome?

I have basically kept my separate careers separate until recently (Iused to maintain a science CV and separately an Arts CV). But I havebeen extremely lucky that my art career, which never paid me anythinguntil three years ago after 30 years of volunteer work, is now my fulltime employment.

The hardest thing has been convincing my scientific colleagues thatart-science was more than science illustration or science educationoutreach, and that the interaction would change the way science isdone and what it studies. It has been gratifying to see the STEM toSTEAM movement in the last few years where the ideas that hybrids haveespoused for decades at least are now getting public discussion andattention. The work of Robert Root Bernstein(https://vimeo.com/157058429 ) has helped me understand the sociologyof what is going on. A book I enjoyed recently is Randall Collins TheSociology of Philosophies: A Global Theory of Intellectual Change.(http://www.amazon.com/The-Sociology-Philosophies-Global-Intellectual/dp/0674001877)

Another hard thing was keeping the Leonardo non-profits going(Leonardo Journal is now celebrating its 50th). Running and keepinggoing an arts nonprofit is really difficult; we have been lucky tohave a dedicated collaborators (I think particularly of the late SteveWilson and the former Leonardo managing editor Pam Grant Ryan.

4- What have been the greatest opportunities/breakthroughs?

It has been exhilarating seeing the success of the art science and arttechnology creative community. Leonardo has been a witness, apromoter, and a documenter of an international group of pathbreakersthat developed so much of the basis for the digital culture that isnow emerging.

Some of the proudest moments have been setting up programs andworkshops. In the 1990's Annick Bureaud and I organized a series ofspace and the arts workshops in Paris(http://www.olats.org/space/space.php ). At the beginning this was adozen people in my living room with professionals in space andastronautics and professional artists. Innumerable collaborations werespawned by this series of 'convenings. Lesson learned – if you areworking in a hybrid field, often the professionals are invisible toeach other. Create situations where they meet each other.

And right now I am really excited by the work I am involved in in datasonification- I think we are path breaking new interesting researchmethods and awesome art.

5- What would you do differently, knowing then what you know now?

I have been lucky, each step in my career grew out of the previousstep ( I moved from MIT, to Berkeley, to Marseille, to Dallas and next?). Again it comes down to the piloting through chaos thing. I canthink of mistakes I have made ( hmm we jumped on too quickly on CDItechnology. ) In terms of doing things differently, I wish I had readDavid Bohm's 'On Dialogue'(http://sprott.physics.wisc.edu/Chaos-Complexity/dialogue.pdf ) beforeI was 55. Figuring out the new context in which one is stepping takesa lot of real exploration and dialogue. I only learned abouttranslation studies after I got to Dallas. It is easy to misreadsignals from people who are important in the context you are trying todo something a bit unusual in.

6- Any advices to someone who may want to walk in your footstep?

If you are working deeply in a hybrid practice – bring people withshared interest together. This can just be a few people in your homecity, or begin on line. Dhru Deb who is also in this discussion and isa cancer researcher and artist is doing just that trying to connectthe cancer researchers involved in the arts(http://www.leonardo.info/isast/journal/calls/artandcancer.html ) . AsI said above- people in this hybrid careers are often not visible toeach other (our organisations generally marginalize them in the publicpresentation of their activities).

Document your work and show it to others. This can be podcasts in theCreative Disturbance platform we just started(http://creativedisturbance.org/ ), or articles in publications orpapers at relevant conferences or just a good personal web site. It isso much easier now than 50 years ago to reach and connect with peoplewith shared interests.

Develop a reputation management plan. I never did this and wish I hadinvested the time articulating what I was trying to do and making thisvisible across my activities. And with your reputation management plandraw attention to your work (as documented above)

Seek out mentors. Often your close environment may not have olderprofessionals who share your double interest. They probably existwithin 50 kilometers of you. Find them.

7. Add other questions and your responses you think are relevant

Much art science practice is collaborative. I believe collaborationcan be taught as a skill and practice. The collaboration andmanagement training I received at NASA taught me much – in this caseon projects involving scientists, engineers, managers, companies. ArtScience collaboration is even more difficult. I don't think it's justan implicit skill. I am very impressed with the group working on theScience of Team Science. Check out their best method manuals(http://www.scienceofteamscience.org/scits-a-team-science-resources ).

I like to say 'interdisciplinary is not a discipline'. Eachart-science collaboration has complications that arise from the verydifferent research and production cultures. And Art Science Career islike piloting through chaos.

For thirty year I have had a friend and colleague Julian Gresser. WhenI first met him he was working on 'strategic alliance' management.Getting companies to collaborate ( eg Japanese, American andEuropean). If you think art-science collaboration is difficult trythose! In the last ten years Julian has written a couple of booksabout "Piloting Through Chaos" (http://explorerswheel.com/about ). Ingeneral I am not a big fan of self-improvement books (and I sometimesfind Julian a bit too 'spiritual' for me). But his core idea ofpiloting through chaos using the multiple compasses of ones dividuatedself : professional goals and activities, personal, physical andphilosophical ( spiritual) structured using the principle ofintegrity, to re integrate the dividuations seems like common sensewhen trying to break a path through a world dominated by disciplinarystructure and reward systems.

This set of responses is submitted to : WHAT ADVICE WOULD YOU GIVE TOYOUNG PROFESSIONALS WHO ARE SEEKING TO PURSUE HYBRID ART-SCIENCECAREERS ?

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